In 2003 I began the idea of owning a business, but had no idea where to start. As an engineer in a cozy job the risk to be without income made it look like an impossible dream.
To make the dream real, I decided to select a name for the business because it carried zero risk. This process took about two years. Every time I doubted that it would ever happen, I could tell myself it's already happening. What I didn't realize at that stage, was that I didn't only think of the name, but also subconsciously of all other issues to create the business.
In 2005 my first major milestone occurred. An electronics component representative, introduce me to a new GPS chip. I grabbed the opportunity, and immediately created a GPS module and ATM location management concept for a Major bank in South-Africa and and a presentation was set-up. To look more professional, I decided it was important to have a registered name, and I tried to register the business. Unfortunately the name I spent so much time selecting, already existed, and I had to come up with a new name in two weeks. I did this, and registered the business. The presentation went extremely well, but my concept was declined because it was too futuristic. So I was back at square one. At least this time my business was registered.
During the next year I added all my business-related expenses into a formal accounting system to teach myself accounting. I did a lot of marketing for the concept I created, but it was dead. During this period, my business thinking continued to grow, although I had no income.
At the end of year 1 my business had expenses of about $2500. This made me realize that I was sponsoring an entity with my salary (I see the business as it's own entity, and not an extension of myself). I decided the business had to create it's own income. This caused a major mind shift, from trying to develop the next big concept into selling anything.
Soon afterwards I made my first sale. I re-sold a portion of my office bandwidth for $40. I then registered as a reseller of computers, and soon afterwards started making computer sales. (Something an engineer don't do in a very status-conscious South-Africa). I also began doing part time contracting design and basically worked my 8 hour day job, just to go home and do another 4 to 8 hours at home. In the free hours left, I started a new concept project in the medical field, to be less dependent on contracting.
During a holiday trip later that year, I created a mind map of where I see the business, and then realized that I had everything to resign. I made the decision to resign within a month, which I did.
Within a week I got my first contract. One after the other contracts soon followed, and I managed to invoice enough to survive.
Initially my business-plan was to do contracting, PC selling, PC maintenance, developing my medical database concept, running a business-lounge web forum and to do technology management. I basically did anything that would create income. 3 Months into the business I started refining my business-plan. I realized I was going nowhere fast. The result was a total rethink/redesign of my original business plan. I realized that I am an electronic data communications specialist, most contracts I worked on was on data protocols. I also had the medical background from working on the database, and I am from Africa. I soon realized the gap. S-Curve technologies could be the Sub-Sahara African medical data specialists. I started marketing this and soon created business associations with similar groups. I selected contracts in line with my vision, thus creating the technology skills in my business. I created products in line with the data communications, and thus the second phase of growth started. I'm now in negotiations with medical data products, and I am often traveling to install, integrate and manage data systems. Most of it is done on contractual basis, but negotiations for my own product development is already ongoing. I am not known yet as the Sub-Sahara data specialist, but the exponential growth is there.
To learn more about this author, visit Henk Boshoff 's Website.
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